Governor scoffs at cap

The state of California is taking legal action to lessen federal oversight of its prison system, Gov. Jerry Brown announced in a press conference Tuesday (Jan. 7).

Brown was referring mainly to a federal court order to cap the state’s prison population at 110,000 by June of this year. This was enacted in 2006, when the-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared an overcrowding emergency. Since then, California’s inmate population has decreased by 43,000 to 119,200, largely as a result of the Public Safety Realignment (AB 109). State officials assert further reductions threaten public safety.

The state is also taking legal action to end “intrusive supervision” of inmate health care resulting from a 1991 class-action lawsuit that alleged the prison’s mental-health-care system was unconstitutional.